When I was a student back in the 80s in East London we used to live in a flat in West Ham, right next to the tube station, behind these flats were some football fields and behind those a huge graveyard. The graveyard and crematorium were built in the 1870s to relieve the pressure from a hugely expanding Victorian London and the surplus of dead bodies that needed somewhere to go! Anyway, one of the more famous graves in said graveyard belongs to one Elizabeth Stride who died in 1888. Her claim to fame (if you can call it that) is that she was officially the third victim of Jack the Ripper, I'm sure she would have preferred to remain anonymous! However, here she lies to this day, or at least her mortal remains do.
Born in Sweden in 1843 Elizabeth had a very tough life. She moved to London in 1866 but her lot didn't improve much, poverty, a failed marriage, alcoholism and prostitution, all fairly common for poor single Women in the East End at that time. On the night of her murder she visited the Queens Head pub on Commercial Street (which is still there) and was last seen leaving at around 11:45pm in the company of one or two acquaintances and/or clients. Her lifeless body was discovered at 1:00am the next morning in Dutfield's yard off Berner Street (since renamed to Henriques Street) dead from a fatal six inch incision to the neck aged 45. Forever sealed into London history.
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